China
Most valuable brands of China include 15 tobacco brands
Beijing - World Brands Lab rated the top 500 most valuable brands in China of 2008, and 15 of them were tobacco brands, such as Yunyan, Mount Hongtashan, Furongwang, Chunghwa, Baisha, the Great Red Eagle, and the General.

The World Brands Lab announced the 500 most valuable brands had a total “brand value of 3,492.407 bn yuan (US$498.915 bn), with an average of 6.985 bn yuan (US$997.85 mn) for each brand.”

The list of financially viable brands was determined using financial, brand intensity, and consumer behavior analyses.

Israel
Genetically engineered tobacco could save lives
Jerusalem - Professor Charles Arntzen of Arizona State University in the United States of America has been working with Hebrew University in Israel to boost production of vaccines for poultry and humans, and has found that using tobacco is much more effective to this end when compared to other produce.

Tobacco plants are being used to mass-produce less expensive and more efficient vaccines which against hepatitis B and cervical cancer, and can halt gastroenterological norovirus infections. In addition, the research regarding tobacco plants may possibly improve treatment for both Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

Italy
For Italian scientist, tobacco means cleaner air
Rome - Italian geneticist Corrado Fogher of Plantechno Srl and his team have turned oil from tobacco seeds into a biofuel that can run anything from a water boiler to a power generator.

“The tobacco plant can grow on marginal land where you can’t grow any other plants,” said Fogher, mentioning that farmers would not need to replace their current crops with this tobacco. Fogher claims this tobacco is cheaper to grow than other biofuel-related crops, and that for every 2.5 acres that are grown, two tonnes of oil can be taken from the seeds, nearly double the oil output of soy.

The oil can be used for stationary motors, such as power generators, and must be mixed with palm oil to be used as biodiesel. Tests will be run in a Hospital this October.

United Kingdom
Call to ban all tobacco adverts
London - On May 31st, the World Health Organization (WHO) called upon and all governments the world over, members, and all people involved, to ban all tobacco advertising to decrease youth smoking.

The World Health Organization accused tobacco product manufacturers of using highly sophisticated marketing technologies and techniques to encourage smoking among young people, especially girls in poorer countries. It also claims that 5% of the world was covered by bans on tobacco promotion, sponsorship, and advertising, and that current measures are not enough to protect the nearly 2 bn young people claimed to be targeted by magazines, the internet, films, and other modern media.

Citing the increase of female smokers in Russia over the last 10 years, where the amount of regulation relating to tobacco and tobacco products is very minimal, and the decrease of smokers in Canada, where smoking is tightly restricted and heavily regulated, the World Health Organization seems to be implying that more smoking regulation will lead to decreases in the smoking rate. The WHO also accused manufacturers of “continuing to attract young people by ‘falsely’ associating cigarettes with ‘glamour, energy and sex appeal,’” said the BBC.